Mindfulness and the Discovery of the SELF
Anyone who has ever sat at home, healthy,
well fed, surrounded by loved ones, and suffering from intense anxiety will readily agree
that peace of mind is the necessary condition for happiness. But how can we learn to have
peace of mind when the mind is by nature restless, projecting its wants and fears
endlessly into the past and the future?
Think about your favorite activity for a moment. When you are really enjoying something
you like, how do you feel? As you listen to your favorite music with full attention, other
thoughts and desires fade away. You are simply in the moment. There is contentment,
peace. Inevitably, of course your mind kicks back in. How can you sit and listen
to music? You need to clean the house, or think about your job, or get something to
eat, or worry about finances, or make a phone call, or any of a thousand things. No longer
in the moment, you’re off and running.
If you could train your mind to let go of other desires, returning to them when the actual
moment has come to do the bills and make the phone call, you would be able to experience
peace of mind. The road to peace of mind is through a practice called mindfulness. Its
opposite, the state in which the mind is in many places at once, is called
mindlessness.
Mindfulness Meditation in Action
Mindfulness is meditation in action and involves a “be here now approach” that
allows life to unfold without the limitation of prejudgment. It means being open to an
awareness of the moment as it is and to what the moment could hold. It is a relaxed state
of attentiveness to both the inner world of thoughts and feelings and the outer world of
actions and perceptions.Mindfulness means really being present with the food when eating,
enjoying it rather than thinking about other things. It means openness to the experience
of motion when taking a walk and to the sights and sounds around you.
Mindfulness requires a change in attitude. The joy is not in finishing an activity, the
joy is in doing it. Those of you who are Type A’s will find that this is completely
foreign to your usual way of perceiving things. Remember that Type A’s tend to engage
in polyphasic behaviors; they try to do several things simultaneously. The reality of
thinking and doing, however, is that we can only think or do one thing at a time. The mind
can dart back and forth between several things, but it can hold only one thing in full
focus. Polyphasic thinking therefore, wastes time. It also creates enormous stress.
Opening to the Moment
You can train yourself to be mindful by cultivating awareness of where your mind is and
then making a choice about where you want it to be. For example, if you need the time
walking to the bus stop to plan the day, then you have made a conscious choice. Try to
plan without falling into rumination that leads to nothing but tension.
If you don’t need to plan, than just be. Center on your breathing, let out a
sigh of relief, and then let yourself experience the rhythm of breathing and walking.
After a while you’ll fall into a comfortable stride, perhaps two steps to the
in-breath and two steps to the out-breath, or any cadence that suits you. This can be the
focus – the anchor – that holds your mind still as you open up your attention to
what is around you – the trees, the clouds, the people – without judging. Just
enjoy the moment. Practice abdominal breathing several times daily. Put up little
signs where you will see them as reminders.
Awareness of Thought and Physical Reaction
Inevitably, while practicing mindfulness, your mind will wander. Learning to observe where
it wanders to is also a practice in awareness.
Thoughts are of two varieties. Non-afflicting: Thoughts like “I wonder what’s
for dinner?” or “Should I watch TV or read a book?” come and go all the
time without getting a rise out of the body. They don’t matter that much. Afflicting:
Thoughts like “I wonder why my spouse and I don’t get along?” or
“I’m scared that my disease is going to kill me” get a definite rise out of
the body. They produce an emotional response like fear, guilt, or anger.
Because such thoughts draw us out of the present moment, as well as getting stored in
the body, they are very powerful.
One of my patients, a young nurse who experienced anxiety attacks, was amazed when
she realized that the anxiety did not spring full-blown from
nowhere. There were certain thoughts that always preceded her attacks while others
kept them going. When she learned to control her thoughts, her anxiety disappeared.
Going Beyond the Mind: The Witness
Try this experiment before reading further. Since the mind speaks in words, for the next
minute become the witness, the listener of your mind. Close your eyes, breath a sigh of
relief, take three abdominal breaths, and listen to your mind for one minute.
What happened? You probably had one of two experiences. Either you watched your thoughts
go by or, strangely, there were no thoughts at all. My patients are often amazed that when
they watch the mind closely, it tends to stop or slow down. Usually the experience of
witnessing the mind, whether the mind falls silent or keeps on running, is one of
peacefulness. You don’t stop existing if the mind becomes quiet. You are still aware
of your own existence and your own consciousness, and that awareness is quite peaceful.
Try the experiment again for a minute.
Meditation develops the ability to become aware of a completely non-judgmental part of the
mind, that of the Witness. The Witness is the part of your mind that watches-that is
aware of thinking. Since the Witness is beyond the ego, it is not caught up in judging and
is thus content in any situation. Another name for the Witness is the Self, or the
unconditioned mind. It is the same in everyone because it is not conditional on what our
experiences have been. It exists previous to experience and the arising of the different
parts of the mind. In many different psychologies and philosophies, the ego is called the
self with a small ‘s’ because it represents our own personal history, complete
with all the limitations of our attitudes and fears. The Self with a big ‘S’
represents completely unlimited potential.
Even-Mindedness: Letting the Judge Rest
John was caught in the most familiar bind of them all: wishing for life to be different.
That is the essence of suffering. The only way to derail that suffering is to let go of
desires, the wants and fears that prevent us from living in the present. Desiring things
we don’t have – the “if onlys”– and desiring to avoid the things
we don’t want –the “what ifs”– are the ego’s main
preoccupation. Desires are always the cause suffering, of falling out of
the present into the ego’s ruminations.
How many times has your mind told you that could be happy if you lost ten pounds? made
more money? had your health? Then, even if these things come to pass, you just move on to
the next set of conditions for happiness. The conditions are like the proverbial carrot
that dangles in front of the donkey. You never reach them.
Happiness can occur only at the moment that desires cease. At that time the mind is still.
It’s not thinking, not wanting or fearing; it is totally absorbed and attentive. Can
you remember the experience of being really thirsty on a hot summer’s day and the
contentment of taking a drink? Every time the mind is completely absorbed – perfectly
mindful – it grows still, and you automatically experience the background of
unconditioned consciousness – the Self – that is always there but is usually
hidden behind the ripples of the mind. Because gratification of a desire leads to the
temporary stilling of the mind and the experience of the peaceful, joyful Self it’s
no wonder that we get hooked on thinking that happiness comes from the satisfaction of
desires. This is the meaning of the old adage, “Joy is not in things, it is in
us”.
Although getting something we want or avoiding something we don’t can give us peace
briefly, it never lasts. The mind is like a junkie, on the prowl for its next hit of
peacefulness by looking to satisfy a desire. Between satisfactions, the experience is
generally unpleasant. True peacefulness comes from abandoning the illusion that satisfying
desires brings pleasure. It is called evenhandedness. In that state,
you regard every moment as an opportunity to live fully, to be
aware. Instead of doing the dishes with the attitude that life is on hold until the
unpleasant chore is over, you can choose to do the dishes mindfully, observing the
sensations of the water, the bubbles, the feel of the plates. In the state of mindful
observation there are no more judgements about pleasant or unpleasant. The mind grows
still and you can feel the contentment of the Self.
Finding peace of mind presents us once again with the challenge to let go. Developing the
capacity of taking a breath and backing up into the position of the Witness – the
observing Self-is the fastest mode for learning to be mindful. Breathing while noticing
that you are experiencing anger is mindfulness. Being so stuck in the experience of anger
that you are overcome by it is suffering. The highest ideal of self-understanding comes
when a person’s ego has retired to the extent that praise and blame are treated
equally. There’s no puffing up if things go well, and no shriveling away if things go
poorly. This is surely a high goal, so it’s helpful to remember Einstein’s
words: “Nobody is able to achieve this completely but the striving for such
achievement is in itself a part of the liberation and a foundation for inner
security”.
Tips for Living Mindfully
1. Continue watching your mind. Identify the kinds of desires, the “if onlys”
that separate you from being happy now, and the “what ifs” that could deprive
you of happiness later. You may find that your ego revolves around a few repetitive
concerns. Write these down. When they occur, congratulate yourself for becoming aware of
them. Practice using your breathing as a reminder to let them go. Sometimes it helps to
write your anxieties down on a pad so that you can take appropriate action on them at a
time that you set aside for that purpose. There’s no point worrying about cleaning
the house or writing a report or having a conversation before it happens. Do things as a
matter of conscious choice, chipping away at unconscious conditioning.
2. Choose at least one activity each day to carry out mindfully-with your full attention, like a meditation. If you are chopping vegetables, chop vegetables. Absorb yourself in the colors, the textures, the motions. If you are drying off after a shower, just dry yourself. It feels great. You will be amazed at how different a plum tastes when you are mindful. Richard Alpert, the Harvard psychologist who spent years studying consciousness, sums up mindfulness in the message Be here now. Put up a few signs around the house as reminders. The practice is easy; it’s remembering to do it that’s hard.
3. Don’t let your ego bully you and scare you off. Old patterns are hard to change, and usually, as soon as you try, they seem to get stronger in response. This is natural. Many people think they are worse off than before when they start to notice themselves. You are no worse off; you have simply realized what goes on inside. Awareness is the first step to making new choices. It is worth the temporary discomfort to get to know yourself.
4. Use mindfulness to cope with pain and anxiety. If you feel
anxious feelings arising inside, try to witness them. Instead of getting stuck in judging,
be the observer. By not engaging the mind in battle, by watching and letting go, it will
soon become quiet.
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